Numerous groups that advocate for comprehensive sex education, including the American School Health Association, Advocates for Youth, and the American Association for Health Education came together in 2011 and produced guidelines and a model timeline for implementation of comprehensive sex education curriculum entitled “National Sexuality Education Standards: Core Content and Skills, K-12” (NSES), which was released by the organization Future of sex education Initiative (FoSE). These standards are guidelines for curriculum which detail what information and topics are developmentally appropriate to teach students corresponding with their grade levels. These are guidelines, which sometimes mistakenly are viewed as a mandatory part of the common core state standards (CCSS).
Getting any or non-abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education into some states and school districts presents ample challenges by itself. For this reason, some might argue that calling for positively framed LGBTQ inclusive sex education curriculum, either at this point in time, or in general, is outrageous. However, when fighting for the health, safety, and well-being of students, it is crucial to do so on behalf of all of them. While there are many schools currently met with high amounts of resistance to the cis/heteronormative affirmative sex education curriculum they are trying to implement, there are others with successful sex education classes or programs that are still failing to include LGTBQ inclusive material, which is unacceptable.
Estimates of New HIV Infections in the United States for the Most-Affected Subpopulations, 2010
I also spoke with Pheonix, who currently attends high school in the midwest. Xe commented on the fact that while xir health teacher was very accepting, he also only explained sex education topics in a hetero/cisnormative context. In addition, not only did he exclude any discussion of sex/gender, he used the terms interchangeably. This is particularly problematic because it perpetuates the common misconception that sex and gender are the same thing to students, which is damaging to many members of the queer community. Pheonix also expressed frustration at the lack of content on sexual attraction, stating “I feel like he didn't take the fact that some people might not want sex into account.” Xe calls attention to the hugely important fact that even if LGBTQ inclusive sex education curriculum is implemented, work will still need to be done to make sure that queer and non-binary and diverse sexualities, such as asexual identities, addressed and not even further marginalized.
http://faduja.is/fadu-myndina/
Additional Resources
Advocates for Youth: Resource Center
Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States
IMPACT Queer Sex Education Program
Queering Sex Ed Tumblr (written by and for queer youth)
Works Cited
Implementing Sex Education. Planned Parenthood, n.d. Web. 6 Nov. 2014.
Magee, J C., L Bigelow, S Dehaan, and B S. Mustanski. "Sexual health information seeking online: a mixed-methods study among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender young people." Health Education & Behavior (2011). Ebsco. Web. 5 Nov. 2014.
"National Sexuality Education Standards: Core Content and Skills, K-12 ." Future of sex education Initiative. The George Gund Foundation, 2012. Web. 6 Nov. 2014.